Also Interesting: Comparing biographies of MRS. W and Kerry
 

Now, I'm the last person to think that a first lady should have ANY effect on a person's voting decision, unless it just shows really bad taste in the person who married her. Nevertheless, I find it very interesting to compare the biographies of the two mrs in the campaign, as they are soooo completely different.

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Teresa Heinz Kerry brings an extraordinary range of experience and talent to the campaign trail for her husband. She has been deeply involved with a number of issues that are equally important to her husband, including the environment, children, women's issues, and health care and wellness. She has been an outspoken advocate for human rights, and a strong supporter of the arts.

Born in Mozambique, fluent in five languages, she has combined compassion and common sense to become a force for innovation and social progress as leader of one of the nation's largest private foundations. After studying in South Africa and Switzerland, she moved to the United States to work for the United Nations. In 1966, she married Senator John Heinz, with whom she had three sons. Shortly after celebrating their 25th wedding anniversary in 1991, she lost her husband in a plane crash.

Turning down offers to run for her husband's Senate seat, she became chair of The Howard Heinz Endowment and the Heinz Family Philanthropies. Under her leadership, the Heinz foundations are widely known for developing innovative strategies to protect the environment, improve education and the lives of young children, broaden economic opportunity, and promote the arts.

She started advocating for women early, attending the first meeting of the Women's Political Caucus in Pennsylvania in 1972. She established the Women's Institute for a Secure Retirement in 1996 to educate women about pensions, savings, and retirement security.

Their mutual interest in environmental issues brought Teresa and John together. She was first introduced to John Kerry by Senator Heinz at an Earth Day rally in 1990. In 1992, she ran into Kerry at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, where she was representing U.S. non-governmental organizations. In 1993 they began dating, and were married in the presence of her three sons and his two daughters on Memorial Day in 1995.

Teresa has received numerous awards and 10 honorary degrees for her many works. In September of last year, she was presented with the Albert Schweitzer Gold Medal for Humanitarianism, for her work protecting the environment, promoting health care and education and uplifting women and children throughout the world. She was recently elected a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

In addition to her three sons and two step-daughters, Teresa is the almost inordinately (but understandably) proud grandmother of one grandchild.


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Laura Welch Bush shares America's concerns about the education of our children. Through her national initiative called Ready to Read, Ready to Learn, she stresses that America's children can't wait to read. In fact, they should have a book and an adult to read with long before they start school.

She urges more Americans to become teachers; discusses preparing young children for learning and school; and wants parents and other adults to have important information on child rearing and cognitive development.

On September 8, 2001, Mrs. Bush launched the first National Book Festival, which featured authors from across the nation and was attended by 30,000 people. Building on the success of the first festival, Mrs. Bush hosted the second annual National Book Festival on October 12, 2002. Seventy award-winning authors, illustrators and storytellers participated in the event which was attended by 45,000 people. Mrs. Ludmila Putina, wife of Vladimir Putin, President of the Russian Federation, traveled to America to attend the festival.

Since the tragedy of September 11, Mrs. Bush has focused her energy on helping our nation, especially children, through the healing process. She encourages Americans to spend more time together as families and support the teachers who take care of their children every day in school.
Mrs. Bush joined a worldwide effort to stop the Taliban's oppression of women and children in Afghanistan. In November 2001, Mrs. Bush became the first First Lady in history to record a full presidential radio address, speaking out on the plight of women and children under the oppressive Taliban regime in Afghanistan. In May 2002, Mrs. Bush addressed the people of Afghanistan through Radio Liberty in Prague, the capitol of the Czech Republic.

In her speeches and public appearances, she expresses what many Americans believe: that every human being should be treated with dignity; and that no child should be left behind in school, or in life.

Mrs. Bush is also interested in women's health issues - particularly heart disease and breast cancer awareness. In Texas, she worked with the Governor's Spouse Program of the National Governors Association to promote women's health issues. She worked to establish Adopt-A-Caseworker programs and Rainbow Rooms throughout Texas. Rainbow rooms provide abused and neglected children with basic necessities such as clothing and diapers.

Her love of education and reading began in her youngest years and guided her to a career as a Texas public school teacher and librarian.

She attended Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas, where she earned a Bachelor of Science degree in education in 1968. After college, she worked as a teacher at Longfellow Elementary School in the Dallas Independent School District until 1969 and then moved to Houston, Texas, where she taught at John F. Kennedy Elementary School in the Houston Independent School District until 1972.

Later, she enrolled at the University of Texas at Austin and earned a Master of Library Science degree in 1973. Afterward, she worked at the Houston Public Library, Kashmere Gardens Branch until she moved back to Austin in 1974.

She worked as a librarian at Dawson Elementary School until 1977, when she met George Walker Bush at the home of mutual friends. They married in November 1977 and made their home in Midland. In 1981, George and Laura Bush became the proud parents of twin girls, who are named Barbara and Jenna, after their grandmothers.

Today she brings her experienced viewpoints, her love of children and her interest in education to a much broader audience as the wife of the 43rd President of the United States, George W. Bush.

EDIT: actually, I guess they're not THAT different. Never mind.

Ok, I'll start the discussion:

1. Spin: Theresa Heinz Kerry is shown to be a woman who is intelligent enough to speak 5 languages, compassionate enough to perform all sorts of humanitarian work, and effective enough to win all sorts of awards for her work. Laura Bush is also shown to be a compassionate woman. Although her accomplishments are not as great as Theresa, they show her to be a woman who is passionate about her subject (literacy).

2. Connection to husband: Theresa's connection with her husband is shown to be based at least in part on ideological basis, as they both met at an Earth Day rally. No other connection is mentioned. In contrast, Laura's accomplishments are often described as being a subsidiary role in George W Bush's accomplishments--speaking out against the Taliban's repression of women after September 11th, getting the 1st lady of Russia to attend her National Book Festival. I think the idea is to promote the sense that Laura is someone who "stands by her man."

So what again are we talking about?

It seems like both women are admirable in their own way.

*confused*

I think both women would be good for the job, perhaps better then the people who are running for it?

oh wait, we're not talking about them running for president? ;)

lebell: i'm more interested in the spin that gets attached to the women, how the campaigners are trying to use the wives to help get their husband's re-elected. After all, the wives' biographies are prominent on both campaign websites, so I thought they would be worth analyzing.

As I said before, I personally take no stock in the wives as a reason for voting for a president, but I would be interested to hear if others do. But if you want my opinion of who appears to be the better woman based on the biographies, I would say it is CLEARLY mrs. kerry.

Personally, I just look at the spouse from a relationship standpoint.

If there is a lot of personal strife, that might be indicative of some personality problems.

That Kerry's wife has more blue blood credentials than Bush's doesn't mean anything to me.

Right lebel--that's why the spin is interesting--Kerry's biography focuses on her accomplishments, while Bush's biography emphasises strongly her support for her husband.

There was an interesting article on Alternet a few days back that described how the women of the Bush administration put a face on the compassionate issues while the other hand does whatever.

That is, Laura speaks about reading, education, and the importance of teaching while the "No Child Left Behind" goes unfunded. I have no idea how she feels about this stuff, she likely really does think it's important and may even think poor children and/or their parents are just too lazy to care. In any case, this might give you some insight as to why the emphasis is on her support for George. Also, Christian Right denominations don't, generally, appreciate women as the first figure. An ideal woman, to the conservative branches of Lutherans and Baptists, and etc., is one who supports her husband, not one who speaks out or "wears the pants" in the family.

That's almost exactly what I would have said. Bush wants the Christian vote. Many people that would vote for Bush would rather have a woman that shuts up and makes a pretty smile. Kerry wants the woman vote, therefore his wife is portrayed as an individual who can accomplish big things on her own.

i think mrs bush seems like a sweet lady
but she doesnt seem to be very intelligent, so she doesnt see that stuff like "no child left behind" is bullshit